CHAPTER TEN
THE TEST OF TALENT
“They know not, neither will they understand; they walk on in darkness...” (Psalms 82:5)
Like I said in the introduction, many people don’t even know they’re gifted. Some are in the dark as far as talents and potentials are concerned. There are various ways to know how gifted you are and what you are talented with.
It’s in What You Love
Someone said to me one day; “try your hands on so many things until you find the one you love.” The Bible says in Ecclesiastes 9:10; “whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might…” Sometimes you find out that you have good feet to run, a nice tone to encourage others, a good voice to sing, excellent thoughts to express in writing, and perhaps many others. If you are not sure which one of them is your talent, keep doing everyone of them until you find the one you are madly in love with.
Note also that you can be multi-talented. The bottom line is; you must be in love with whatsoever you are doing. If you hate it, then you’re by no means gifted in that area.
Be Guided!
Remember that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth. He doesn’t lie; but tells the truth. And according to Jesus, He guides us: “howbeit, when he, the Spirit of Truth is come, he will guide you into all truth…” (John 16:13). He knows everything about you; and that includes things about your potentials.
It’s therefore important to partner with the Holy Spirit so you can be guided to find out what your potentials are. John 14:17 tells us that he dwells in us. That also means he knows us more that we know ourselves.
Human Confirmations Matter
People’s opinion may not always count, but at times, they serve as valuable confirmations to what you were probably confused about. In truth, there’s hardly anything God tells you through the Holy Spirit that He doesn’t try to repeat through someone around you. The Holy Spirit tells you the truth, but the people around often confirm it so you can be sure.
Whenever people start telling you about a particular endowment they have noticed in you, you have to think about it. But the Holy Spirit must first impress it into your heart. If He hasn’t told you, then forget it. For example, many times people tell me “you are tall, you should be good at basketball.” But I hate balls, especially basketball; and the Holy Spirit has never told me anything about basketball. I can say therefore that those people are only carried away by my height.
However, whenever people around begin to tell you something relating to some endowments that you already have an inner intuition about, then you’ve got human confirmations to think about.